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Sauce

American Sauce for Plum Pudding

A sauce made from powdered sugar, butter, and brandy for plum pudding.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,127 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

American Sauce for Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a mortar, combine the powdered sugar and butter, and pound them together.

  2. Gradually add the brandy until the mixture is well combined.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Powdered sugar
Sweetens the sauce and dissolves into the butter to give it a smooth body.
Butter
Provides fat that makes the sauce rich and creamy and helps it hold together.
Brandy
Adds aroma and thins the mixture into a spoonable sauce as it is added.

The step that matters

Adding the brandy gradually. Pouring in the brandy all at once can make the butter and sugar separate or turn grainy. Adding it slowly lets the fat and sugar emulsify into a smooth, cohesive sauce.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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